G/B/W Enchantress

[g00t]

Hi!

I have a tournament on Sunday, and I think I'm gonna play Enchantress. Unfortunately, it's going to be powerless unless I can borrow the cards... I used CooberP's old enchantress as a base, and built this:

-Mission:Top 4-

// creatures:4
4 Argothian Enchantress

// enchantments:16
3 Sylvan Library
2 Seal of Cleansing
2 Sterling Grove
2 Sacred Mesa
1 Fastbond
1 Worship
1 Overgrown Estate
1 City of Solitude
1 Pursuit of Knowledge
1 Moat
1 Abyss

// others:15
4 Duress
3 Replenish
2 Swords to Plowshears
1 Yawgmoth's Will
1 Vampiric Tutor
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Enlightened Tutor
1 Balance
1 Regrowth

// mana+strips:25
4 Savannah
4 Bayou
2 Scrubland
4 City of Brass
4 Windswept Heath
1 Plains
1 Serra's Sanctum
2 Wasteland
1 Strip Mine
1 Sol Ring
1 Lotus Petal

// sb:15
2 Swords to Plowshears
2 Seal of Cleansing
2 Choke
2 Chalice of the Void
1 Story Circle
1 Replenish
1 City of Solitude
1 Rule of Law
1 Words of Worship/Holistic Wisdom (tbd.)
1 Pernicious Deed
1 Pariah

What I'd like to do, is to put in one more Sterling Grove. I'm just not sure on what to take out: A StoP, maybe? I think that Sui/MonoBlack will be played by one third of the players, in which case it might be better to have the two StoP's main. Ideas?

When I know how much Long.dec/combo people are going to be playing, I'll decide whether to play City of Solitude or Rule of Law maindeck.

I expect:
Some Keeper/RectorTendrils
Some Long.dec
Some Stax/Workshop-decks
One or two U or U/r -control
One or two Sligh
25-33% Mono Black
Some random decks.

I've been doing ok against Keeper and Stax, something like 40/60 to their favour (well, except for against rozetta's keeper, which kicks my ass on a regular basis  ), (powerless) blue control is like 65/35 to my favour. Sligh, Sui and random decks haven't been hard at all so far. I haven't tested enough against Long.dec, what do you think about my chances, how should I play?

Well, thanks for reading so far, and please post if you have any nice ideas.

-erkka

[Matt The Great]

Change the Will to the last Replenish. It does everything Will does but for a lot less mana.

Also, if you want to fit the third Grove, take out the Enlightened Tutor. You don't have any artifacts worth fetching, and Grove provides two other important aspects: cantripping off Enchantress, and protection.

Also: no Enchantress' Prescence?

You definitely don't need FOUR City of Brass. Two at most (two fetches replacing).\n\n

[Thug]

If unpowered I suggest you try out Wild Groth's. They speed up the deck (it's a very mana hungry deck) and if you could find place for some basics they can also be a perfect choice together with a single Earthcraft, cause when I was playing Enchantress I always felt like I could beat everything and everyone except that stupid clock. I think about 25% of my matches with the deck ended in draws with me in total board control...  
(for clarification: Plains + Wild Growth + Earthcraft + Sacred Mesa = Infinitive Pegasi!)

Also matt's suggestions are execellent, and on top of that I think you will need some more creature control in the maindeck with that much suicide in your metagame. Pariah could be maindecked, or a 3rd swords could.

And why do you want the Deed sideboard? any particular reason? maybe it's better off as a Karmic Justice
Good luck with the deck,

Koen

[Terevaune]

Haven't seen this deck in a while - I played unpowered enchantress at the local tournaments here for about 6-8 months and did pretty well.

I wouldn't want to go in without some basic forests, especially if blood moon is big in your area.  My suggestuion would be to drop the cities and go with 2 more scrublands and 2 forests, or 1 more plains and 1 forest.  
Definitiely find room for at least one, preferably two enchantress presence, as you can tutor for them and recur them, but recurring and tutoring for argothians is a lot harder.  You may also want to look at karmic justice.

Versus long, unfortunatley enchantressess biggest weakness was always combo, and long is one of the best.  My advice is to put 4 chalice in the SB and pray game 2.

As for thug's suggestion of wild growth, I tried it and it does work, but in generaly I found explorations generally worked better for the early speed boost.

One last thing I would suggest is to take a look at eternal wind.  It was the deck I finally took my enchantress deck apart for.  I generally prefer it because while enchantress slowly builds up, eternal wind can just go off and lock the opponent out of permanents or kill them.  Here's a link to an old topic I posted on it.  The list in there is pretty good, but I've since cutr future sight for a third confinement, and you'll want to change the ancestral (if you don't have it, a sterling grove if you do) for the 4th brainstorm.  Eternal Wind.  Also, here's WaSP's original build, though it's powered and I didn't like some of the card choices Eternal Wind - by WaSP

Good luck at your tournament.\n\n

[KandyKid]

Why dont i see an Enchantress's Presence? the deck is crying to one, also, Try to putin more Sterling Groves, they are pretection for your shit + tutors, also, put in a pariah, that card = tec + it kills morphlings when its replenished .

Yes, if you have no power, you need wild growths.
You can also try to change one duress for a words of worship, or a words of wisdom(if life totals are a problem for you because of a heavy sly meta or whatever).

Hope taht helped.

[Jacob Orlove]

Quote (KandyKid @ Nov. 12 2003,14:12)You can also try to change one duress for a words of worship, or a words of wisdom(if life totals are a problem for you because of a heavy sly meta or whatever).

Actually, Words of Waste would probably be the best choice. It's an enchantment version of Mind Twist!

[Fastbond]

Parfait would be a better choice given the extremely high percentage of mono-black(better mana base) and the lack of power(parfait doesn't need it as much).  Out of none of the matchups you listed does enchantress have enough of a better matchup than parfait does to make playing enchantress worthwhile.

[Ultima]

One of my teammates plays enchantress hardcore and swears by 4 sterling grove.  Probably drop 1 sylvan library for another grove at least and definitely drop the will for the 4th replenish.
The other grove should probably go in place of the 4th duress.

Also you should think about carpet of flowers against control in the side because its free gas for your mesa.

Also, my guy has experimenting with root maze, so far he says its pretty good and great against combo.  For Enchantress, its like a pseudo-chalice in Keeper, it slows the game down where the enchantress player wants it and hoses control with choke.

[MuzzonoAmi]

I've played Enchantress on and off for a little over a year, and in your deck, I'd cut 1 Duress for Words of Waste, the Overgrown Estate for Words of Worship, drop the Argothians for Presence, and replace Worship with Mirari's Wake. The Wake may seem janky, but it's never been bad for me, and enables you to 'just win' alot of games you shouldn't, provided you have Mesa in play. And if you expect Workshop decks, Aura of Silence is a must, I'd cut Will main and Holistic Wisdom SB to make room. Try to squeeze in the 4th Replenish if you can as well. It'll make you alot better, but its not mandatory.

[Tristal]

>>drop the Argothians for Presence,

WHAT?!?!?  I have nothing against Presence, but oh man, don't take out the engine!

>>and replace Worship with Mirari's Wake. The Wake may seem janky, but it's never been bad for me, and enables you to 'just win' alot of games you shouldn't, provided you have Mesa in play.

When you have Mesa in play, anything else is just 'win more'.  You really need the Enchantress/Worship lock against Sligh first game, too.

If you aren't going the Tax/Rack route, consider Explorations!  If you have a couple of engine pieces on the board already, playing Explorations really makes this feel like Turbo-Enchantress - you just start GOING OFF like crazy.  It is not uncommon to play Exploration, draw 2-3 cards, play a land, play a Seal of Cleansing, draw 2 cards, play your second land, play another Explorarion, draw 2, land, Enchantress, etc etc - loads of fun!  It really laughs at their first turn Smokestack, too.

I'd post a decklist but I haven't tuned it since pre-Long, and I fear it's a little obsolete.

[MuzzonoAmi]

Quote (Tristal @ Nov. 13 2003,10:31)>>drop the Argothians for Presence,

WHAT?!?!?  I have nothing against Presence, but oh man, don't take out the engine!

>>and replace Worship with Mirari's Wake. The Wake may seem janky, but it's never been bad for me, and enables you to 'just win' alot of games you shouldn't, provided you have Mesa in play.

Wake has gotten 1000x better in this deck with the appearenc of Chalice, as it not only allows you to drop your own Chalices for 3 quite easily, but makes Smokestack alot less of a threat, since all your lands now pull double duty. And dropping the Enchantresses for Presence allows you to run Humility and take full advantage of Balance against decks liks Sligh. No more tutoring for a 2 card, 6 mana lock that Sligh can break post SB. The Presence is STRICTLY superior to Argothian because is just as castable, has better synergy with every key card in the deck (Grove, Replenish, Sanctum, itself) and as a bonus, has better art.  As a personal thing, I prefer Abundance in this deck to Pursuit of Knowledge. A quick draw-7 is nice, but the ability to draw 3 per turn and not have the Abundance be useless without Sylvan is more than enough to make that change.

[Jeff32479]

OK well it's been a while since I've posted... let's hope the people on here aren't as pompous as when I used to... I play enchantress regularly... full power, etc... let's look at some of the thoughts mentioned...

Presence is STRICTLY superior to Argothian because is just as castable, has better synergy with every key card in the deck (Grove, Replenish, Sanctum, itself) and as a bonus, has better art.

This is entirely unacceptable...you have to look at mana cost... you can't say something that is 50 percent more mana intensive than a 2 drop is just as castable... let's hope you meant in regards to the one green only...

The synergy with the cards described is true...but rather than take argothians out, why not put presences in? The deck can clearly support 6-7 enchantress's total...and having 7 assuming random distribution almost ensures seeing one in the opening draw.  

As for the deck construction, I can understand your 4 duresses being unpowered... the inclusion of lotus petal I'll accept, albeit reluctantly... but you do need one drops if possible... wild growths, carpet of flowers, eladamri's vineyard if need be...ideally enchantress can come on turn two with a duress in front of it... that's why the moxes of course would be infinitely better.

Yawgmoth's will is rather extraneous in the deck... as was pointed out the 4th replenish is better.  My opinion is that even the 4th replenish is unnecessary...you have regrowth which can act as a 4th replenish just fine.

I think you can trim vampiric tutor as you shouldn't need to be getting anything that can't be fetched with sterling grove with the inclusion of some presences... so taking out will and vamp will leave you 2 spots for presences, and the last enlightened should definitely be a sterling grove(foil if possible   )

Fastbond may not help your deck... if your engine is going to the point where you can afford to be playing more than one land i.e. drawing 2 cards or so off each enchantment, the game should be over really soon.  Once again, you don't have power, so you'll have more lands obviously, but it seems extraneous.

I can sympathize with your 2 swords to plowshares, since mono black is such a godawful matchup, but the inclusion of pariah would be a good choice... if you must keep them in, totally understandable... maybe cut fastbond for a pariah...

A card I also love is seal of doom... I've often lamented the fact that it doesn't hit black creatures, which I'm totally in favor of an unrealistic errata for it anytime soon, but it's another way to deal with creatures... unless the swords are in their SOLELY for the mono black matchup, I'd consider one seal of doom.  

Also, not sure why there's one replenish in your board... I think 3 is the optimal number with your inclusion of regrowth... but if there are any matchups that give you fits, i.e. mono black, maybe the inclusion of one compost may help.
Alright, let's see what kind of criticism this post draws... good to be back on here...man they've got Rakso's head as an emoticon... things sure have changed...

[leakycow]

man, talk about an archetype that fell off the face of the Earth the past year.  I'm guessing it was due to the popularity of combo.  I always liked the idea of permanent-based control decks, although I agree with most people that they're not especially fun to play against.

Is enchantress more viable now that chalice seems to have slowed down combo a bit?  Or has the speed of type 1 made this an obsolete pile of cards?

[Nameless]

I'd also throw in my $0.02 by saying that the Enchantress' should be replaced by the enchantment version, simply for one reason...  You don't draw a card by casting another Enchantress.

That being said I'm really shocked not to see even a single copy of Words of Wind.  It's really quite amazing in that you can very quickly start making them bounce several perms a turn and lock down any game before it really gets started.  This works especially well against decks like Stacks and such.

Besides that, Balance is a lot more powerful here.  If you've got no creatures it becomes easy to return everything, dump your hand, and Balance to 0 perms and cards in hand on thier side, while you still have your enchantments hanging around.

I like it for multiplayer games and stuff, and I don't really think it can be a tournament viable deck, but anything is possible!  Still what you need are more generalized solutions to an open field, and a Words will provide this for you.  All the other ones are neat tricks, but they don't actually win you any games or help with board control like this.

[Thug]

Enchantresses should never be replaced with Presence's, just for one reason: The casting cost, oh and off course there's this enchantment called Wordship that wins games coupled with Argothian.

The mana difference is a huge deal, against control you want one a.s.a.p. before they can cast counterspell/mana drain. Against aggro you rather have a cheaper one so that you can actually use it before you fall to your opponents horde.

A single copy of Presence is sufficient, and probably needed, so that you have another 4/5 spells that can find an Enchantress.

And besides combo this deck actually has pretty good matchups...

Koen\n\n

[Nameless]

How is an Argothian going to help against Control?  You made it a point to mention this, so I can't help but add that any Control deck worth it's salt has easy ways to rid the world of lowly untargetable creatures in mass; be it a Balance or an Edict in one for or another.  Enchantment removal, on the other hand, isn't quite as common.  I'd rather have a deck that makes all creature removal dead as opposed to one that has the same card drawing engine but costs 1 less.

I'd also mention that, aside from those methods, a great many people with a large Red base in thier Keeper builds have started storing a Starstorm in the SB as a handy Wish target to counter Decree of Justice and such, which just happens to work perfectly against her and a horde of flying tokens.\n\n

[Thug]

Quote How is an Argothian going to help against Control?  You made it a point to mention this, so I can't help but add that any Control deck worth it's salt has easy ways to rid the world of lowly untargetable creatures in mass; be it a Balance or an Edict in one for or another.  Enchantment removal, on the other hand, isn't quite as common.  I'd rather have a deck that makes all creature removal dead as opposed to one that has the same card drawing engine but costs 1 less.

Ok, this is like ... all nonsense.

Diabolic Edict was played in the era in which Morphling was played, we are past that. Since tokens got the edge over superman edict has been a poor choice, and sees very little play right now.

Balance might be able to get rid from a Argothian Enchantress from time to time, but very little decks pack Balance. Artifact en Enchantmant destruction has been getting more and more popular and I wouldn't say it is all that uncommon anymore, so I would feel a lot more save with an untargetable creature.

And, if playing with Argothian Enchtress the opponent's creature kill is still dead.

The mana cost is a real issue, if you fail to see that I suggest you play the deck some more. An Enchantress is the first thing you want to play (aside from Duress) and should optimally hit the board on turn 1.

Quote I'd also mention that, aside from those methods, a great many people with a large Red base in thier Keeper builds have started storing a Starstorm in the SB as a handy Wish target to counter Decree of Justice and such, which just happens to work perfectly against her and a horde of flying tokens.

Yeah, so they can kill an Enchantress with a Cunning Wished for card, that is gonna cost them 2U + 1RR. Keeper also always has either allay or disenchant to wish for, to take care of Presence, so I don't really see your point here. And for killing pegasi, who cares, when you're in control and creating them, killing them isn't going to stop you. And I really advocate the infinitive pegasi combo.

Koen\n\n

[Jeff32479]

This argument has gotten rather off topic it would seem... it shouldn't be about which is better... argothian clearly is... there's no disputing that...so what if control decks may pack an edict?  Did you stop playing ancestral when gat had 4 misdirections?  Enchantress dying does not = game over.  You really don't even need multiple enchantress in any form on the board...making all enchantments cycle is disgusting enough...against control further, your matchup should be considerable in your favor, barring poor draws by you or god draws by them.  There are far too many things to counter PRIOR to replenish...

What the discussion SHOULD be about is why both aren't run...if you run solely 4 enchantress's... EITHER, the odds of seeing one in your opening hand are 7/15... less than half.  Running 7 enchantress' gives you a 49/60 chance of seeing one in your opening hand, roughly 82 percent.  Your comfort level may be somewhere in between.  I've never heard someone say... I lost that game because I drew TOO many cards off all the enchantress'.  Let's be realistic.

As far as words of wind goes, it's not that fantastic against Stax, and less fantastic against a lot of other decks... requires far too much to set up.  I used to be an advocate of words of worship, since the deck's difficulties lie against aggressive decks, but a main deck seal of doom to me has helped further.  Also, I run 2 seal of cleansing main, and 1 aura of silence... if aura of silence comes down fast enough against stax, it's disgusting...double sphere against them with no drawback?  Absurd.  

In closing, Argothians and the Presence CAN and SHOULD love in harmony.  Argothian is FAR SUPERIOR, much the same way that ancestral recall is too concentrate.  If you can fit them, I think the optimal count is either 6-7, depending on your metagame, space, etc.  I currently run 7 and I think it's the optimal number, but even that doesn't GUARANTEE seeing one by turn 2-3 when and if you'd be ready to cast it without power.

[Tristal]

I just play one Enchantress' Presence... I honestly think it's enough.

I have personal experience with Words of Worship.  Tutoring for Words of Worship against Sligh is GAME OVER a huge majority of the time.  The matchup really just became "Did I draw a tutor or the Words itself in my first seven?"  Sylvan, Enchantress draw... retardedly broken.  Unfortunately, it's still not always enough against Tog, so I still keep a Worship in the deck.  Seal of Doom doesn't help against burn, but I like the idea.

[Queequeg]

I am planning on building and playing unpowered enchantress this winter. Yes it is rude of me to highjack someone else’s thread but it is also bad conduct for me to start my own when one like this is already in progress so I am left with posting my decklist here for advice and discussion.I havn't read all the posts thoughly but I think my post is relvant.

Below is the decklist I plan to build followed by the relevant card discussion.

(60)
Green
(12)
4 Enchantress’ Presence
2 Sylvan
1 City of Solitude
1 Choke
3 Exploration
1 Fastbond
Black
(7)
4 Duress
1 Demonic Tutor
1 Abyss
1 Yawgmoths Will
White
(14)
4 Replenish
2 Sacred Mesa
1 Balance
1 Humility
1 Words of Wisdom
1 Pursuit of knowledge
1 Seal of Cleansing
1 Aura Fracture
1 Pariah
1 Rule of law
Gold
(4)
4 Sterling Grove
Artifact
(1)
1 Sol Ring
Land
(22)
1 Sera’s Sanctum
1 Strip Mine
3 Wasteland
4 City of Brass
4 Windswept Heath
4 Savannah
2 Bayou
2 Plains
1 Forest

Enchantress Presence: The replacement for Argothian, initially the temptation is to run Presence in addition to Argothian. However enchantress has proven to run a sufficient card drawing engine with only 4 enchantress cards for a while now and running Presence over Argothian has several advantages in my eyes. Presence is an enchantment and so trigger’s existing presence’s already in play plus it can also be tutored for with sterling grove. Most importantly however it can be put into play using Replenish and so bypassing countermagic and discard effects. Running no creatures has its advantages also as balance now becomes a wrath of god of 2 mana and Humility now becomes a possible option. The only disadvantages are the loss of Worship, this can be catered in your enchantment selection. Presence can be targeted unlike Argothian but this is a minor draw back with 4 sterling groves typically in enchantress.

Exploration & Fastbond: In an unpowered build some suitable acceleration will need to replace the moxen in order to keep pace with fast aggro strategies. In comparison to Mox exploration and Fastbond give the closest form of acceleration and are better then the obvious choice of wild growth. Even late in the game with the card drawing of enchantress they can still remain effective. A nice bonus is of coarse the synergy with Wastelands and Strip mine.

Yawgmoths Will: This replaces regrowth that is run in most enchantress builds. Admittedly this is more mana intensive, but with 27 mana slots that shouldn’t be a problem. With Fastbond in play replying all your wastelands has potential to be devastating

4 Duress: Mindtwist has been scraped for another Duress without mana drain and misdirection being a big risk 4 Duress was the next step.

Humility: This replaces the moat and is better verse just about every deck.

Words of Wisdom: This replaces Overgrown Estate. It is easier to cast and combined with any of the card drawing effects (Presence, Sylvan, Knowledge) can enable to gain massive amounts of life and does not require to sacrifice land in a mana intensive deck. It should be used against pressure decks including Sligh and Sui. The big drawback is that you can not play responsively with it, but I think the life gaining power outweighs the need for a little future thought.

Aura Fracture: Why this would be excluded from any enchantress build confuses me. Not only does it help in the mirror match and against some combo but it also is needed if you want to survive blood moon and back to basics.

Rule of Law: This card is my tech verses a lot of decks including many combo decks, hulk and gro archetypes, Sligh

Mana Base: 15 white slots, 15 Green slots, 10 black.

[Tristal]

FYI, Words of Wisdom is the crappy draw spell from Odyssey, I think you mean Words of Worship.

Have you tested Rule of Law against anything?  It seems like when I play Enchantress I wanna play way more than one spell per turn (Hey, I'm drawing 3+ cards a turn, right?)

I'm curious as to why you don't play Zuran Orb, if you REALLY want to maximize that Balance by making your engine twice as bad, I think you should go all the way - especially since you play Fastbond and Will here.

Pariah seems to be more for the early game against aggro (Yes, if you get it to land on a Tog, it's really funny - but good luck with that...) and I'd suggest putting Swords in instead - it really helps against the MUD and Mask matchups.  

I'm not sure why Aura Fracture would be any better than Seal of Cleansing.  It's certainly better in the mirror, but offhand I can't think of any other decks besides Parfait it's better than.

Here's my deck, for reference.  Try to avert your eyes from the Land Tax/Exploration "combo", it's pretty janky, but if you're lucky you can really catch them with their pants down.

//NAME: Tristal's Enchantress
        8 Forest
        5 Plains
        4 Savannah
        2 Serra's Sanctum
        1 Mox Pearl
        1 Mox Emerald
        3 Scroll Rack
        1 Orim's Chant
        1 Wild Growth
        1 Sylvan Library
        1 Enlightened Tutor
        1 Squirrel Nest
        1 Earthcraft
        1 Yavimaya Enchantress
        2 Sacred Mesa
        2 Replenish
        1 Zuran Orb
        1 Enchantress's Presence
        4 Argothian Enchantress
        4 Exploration
        4 Land Tax
        1 Sterling Grove
        4 Swords to Plowshares
        3 Seal of Cleansing
        1 Words of Worship
        1 Worship
        1 Wrath of God

Rip it apart, guys.

[Queequeg]

Quote Have you tested Rule of Law against anything?  It seems like when I play Enchantress I wanna play way more than one spell per turn (Hey, I'm drawing 3+ cards a turn, right?)

No the deck is still underconstruction at the moment, and yes in most situations I don't want to Play Rule of Law, but many decks don't work at all if they can only play a single spell a turn, if for example you can drop it early enough alongside duress it can stop Tendrils and stops WGDragon from using the stroke of Genius kill. Imagine it against Sligh, I can play 1 silver bullet a turn whilst sligh is left doing me a crap 3 damage a turn whilst there hand fills up with unplayed spells rendering scroll useless. Well thats the idea anyway.

Quote Pariah seems to be more for the early game against aggro (Yes, if you get it to land on a Tog, it's really funny - but good luck with that...) and I'd suggest putting Swords in instead - it really helps against the MUD and Mask matchups.  

Pariah works with Sterling Grove and Presence. But best of all it works with Replenish so even if is countered the first time it won't if replenish gets through. Plus I can place it onto untargetables like morphling this way.

As for Plowshares you are forgetting that I am running Humility, which I would drop against decks like Mud.

Quote
I'm not sure why Aura Fracture would be any better than Seal of Cleansing.  It's certainly better in the mirror, but offhand I can't think of any other decks besides Parfait it's better than.

Aura Fracture could come out I supose, but on tap enchantment destruction makes me feel all warm in side. Espically with nasty threats like planar void, back to basics and Blood Moon around.

Quote I'm curious as to why you don't play Zuran Orb, if you REALLY want to maximize that Balance by making your engine twice as bad, I think you should go all the way - especially since you play Fastbond and Will here

Damn you for being right, perhapes I should run Overgrown Estate afterall. Plus how is my engine twice as Bad? I did not swap Presence for Argothian so I could get the most out of Balance (that was just a bonus). I swaped them because they are argueably better verses control and allow you to run Humility which is much better than the Moat in almost all situations.

[Tristal]

I thought we went over this?  Argothian is better versus control because it comes out a turn earlier, under Mana Drain.  I have nothing against Presence, but the argument that you can tutor for it easier early on is kind of moot - I DO play a Presence in my deck, so I can tutor for it.  Late game when you already have engine going and you play the second Presence, it's really irrelevant that it draws you the extra card - you're already going off.

I never really thought about Rule of Law shutting down Dragon!  That's really funny!  Unfortunately, all the Dragon decks I know of use Laquatus as their kill, which isn't really stopped by it, though with Rule on the board your Swords is guaranteed to stick (Or they waste a turn Duressing it out of your hand, which may be enough time to set up more shenanigans such as Seal/Fracture - Dragon decks REALLLLLLY hate a Seal on the board. )  Consider two Gaea's Blessing in the sideboard against this (They are good enough anyway that they're ALMOST maindeck material for me, but this serves as a very nice excuse.)

>>Pariah works with Sterling Grove and Presence. But best of all it works with Replenish so even if is countered the first time it won't if replenish gets through. Plus I can place it onto untargetables like morphling this way.

I'll quote that again.

>>if replenish gets through.

Good luck with that.

>>As for Plowshares you are forgetting that I am running Humility, which I would drop against decks like Mud.

You will never, ever get time to drop a 4cc spell against MUD.  Second turn Tangle Wire followed by Smokestack and you are GONE.  Granted Swords does not really help this out either but Seal of Cleansing would!

I've tested the matchup versus Mask and you REALLY need a backbreaking threat early on like Swords or Seal to hurt them.  First turn Ritual-Mask-Nought is not going to be stopped by Humility.

Course, with your metagame the way it is, Humility sounds like a great choice, and if there's ever a reason to drop Argothians from the deck, that would probably be it.  I do think Words of Worship is enough of a way to lock any random deck out of the game, though, and you can use a quicker engine while you do it.

Pretty much any deck that will run hate like Planar Void, Blood Moon etc is only going to have the one target in their deck to hit, so Seal seems superior again.  Also, Seal is much better with Replenish (smash a random mox on their side before casting an obviously-resolving Replenish)

Do you find having black in the deck makes it better against aggro, or does it just lower the consistency?  I haven't tested it, but I like GW just fine.

[Queequeg]

The main reason presence is better verse control IMO is that it works with replenish. Getting replenish through uncountered is a concern, but armed with so many more must counter spells and 4 Duress you should hopely be able to bait out all the counters before you replenish.

I own both Argothains and Presence so If things turn out to be going wrong I can always swap between the two.  

As for Aura Fracture I now agree with you, I'll either swap this for another seal or I might try using Deed. At least with Deed I can nuke everything from the board and then replenish it all back, another reason to run Presence possibly.